ice

ice

The bottom of a glacier is not the most hospitable place on Earth, but at least two types of bacteria happily live there, according to researchers. The bacteria -- Chryseobacterium and Paenisporosarcina -- showed signs of respiration in ice made in the laboratory that was designed to simulate as closely as possible the temperatures and nutrient content found at the bottom of Arctic and Antarctic glaciers, said Corien Bakermans, assistant professor of microbiology, Penn State Altoona. She said that carbon dioxide levels in the laboratory-made ice containing the bacteria, which were collected from glaciers in Greenland and Antarctica, indicated that respiration was occurring at temperatures ranging from negative 27 to positive 24 degrees Fahrenheit.

One major threat of planetary warming is the melting of the great polar ice sheets. Particularly worrisome to researchers is the fragility of the West Antarctic ice sheet, or WAIS. David Pollard, a senior research scientist at Penn State, and Robert M. DeConto, professor of climatology at the University of Massachusetts, have created a computer model of WAIS's last 5 million years. "One of the next steps is to determine if human activity will make it warm enough to start the collapse," said Pollard.

If it seems like this winter has brought more ice storms than normal, there's a good reason, according to Penn State weather experts. It really has. According to Paul Knight, Pennsylvania state climatologist, the Keystone State feels the effect of 12 to 18 winter storms during a typical winter. Of those storms, only two or three would normally produce widespread icy conditions. "Many parts of Pennsylvania have already exceeded their usual number of icing events for a year, and the winter is not even half over," he says. "There is no doubt that the frequency of freezing rain during December and so far in January is unusual, particularly for the central part of the state."

Penn State associate professor of Geosciences Sridhar Anandakrishnan narrates the setting and detonation of a seismic shot beneath the ice at the South Pole. Includes links to video: "Mapping the Ice in Antarctica."

On paper, Richard Alley cuts quite a figure. He's an Evan Pugh professor, holder of the highest academic rank that Penn State bestows. His contributions to ice science and the study of climate are widely cited around the world. He has been called one of the foremost glaciologists of all time. In person, Alley cuts a figure of a different sort. Something closer to the boy rockhound he was in the early 1970s: the kid who spent his days crawling through the caves around Worthington, Ohio, looking forward to meetings of the local geology club.